coo MR. FARRANCE. 



caution is never ' more necessary than in dealing with 

 associates or friends of feeble mind.' Under the most 

 favourable construction there was ground for grave 

 suspicion ; and the trouble ripened into a quarrel and 

 a separation, Mr. Parker taking over any share the 

 other had in Joe Miller, One Act, and Noisy. The 

 other few horses Mr. Farrance owned were soon got 

 rid of, and that gentleman left the turf, and I don't 

 think I ever saw him afterwards. 



I will say of Mr. Farrance that I never had a dis- 

 cordant word with him, nor the occasion for one. His 

 subsequent life was always a mystery to me, in regard 

 to the manner in which he got rid of his considerable 

 wealth. He was not a gambler, never that I heard of 

 played cards or threw dice, and was certainly not fond 

 of betting. He kept no company, lived inexpensively, 

 and had but one child— a daughter, who married well. 

 Yet he lived beyond his means, and squandered a 

 fortune in a short time. A ' dominant simplicity ' 

 seemed to have ruled his actions to the end ; and the 

 crowning act of his old age, when about seventy, was, 

 I am told, the folly of eloping with one of his own 

 female domestics to France, from which country, I 

 think, he never returned; and his name, and that of 

 his hotel, were blotted from the knowledge of the 

 world, except with the few who, like myself, remember 

 him. 



I have referred to Mr. Farrance's reputation as a 

 story-teller. If I venture to reproduce one or two of 



